A caregiver had her ailing 75-year-old patient sign his South Carolina home over to her, and within days of his death she completely redecorated the space, according to the man’s outraged daughter.

Robert Rowland, who suffered from Parkinson’s and a brain injury, died on June 25, 2024, in Conway, about 15 miles from Myrtle Beach, his daughter, Nora Rowland, told WMBF.

But it wasn’t until three days later that Nora discovered that her father had passed away and that his house had been redecorated with ‘highlighter orange’ walls by his at-home nurse, Sarah Smalls, she told the outlet.

‘I go in there, and I see everything is different. She had put up all these random photographs of people I’d never seen before. The walls are painted this god-awful highlighter orange,’ Nora recalled.

Nora, who lives in Baltimore, Maryland, decided to check up on her elderly father in person after not hearing from him on Father’s Day, she recalled.

As soon as she got to the home, Nora noticed that a Ring doorbell camera had been installed and the front door had been changed.

When she rang the doorbell, Smalls delivered the heartbreaking news to her.

‘She tells me, “This isn’t the way I wanted to tell you, but your dad died, and there’s a bunch of other stuff I have to tell you too. Just wait there”,’ Nora recalled.

But the shocking news left the self-described ‘daddy’s girl’ panicked as she made her way into the home through an unlocked window that she knew was open in case of emergencies.

After entering, Nora was immediately confronted with a completely unfamiliar space.

Footage she captured from inside the home showed the bright orange walls with pictures of another family hanging on them.

She screamed from behind the camera as she recorded, saying: ‘Oh my God! Everything is gone! Who the f*** are these people?!’

Soon after, she made her way into the home; Smalls returned, accused Nora of breaking into her property, and called the police to report that she was trespassing.

When officers arrived, Nora was under the impression that they would assist her, but instead, she and her partner were placed in handcuffs after Smalls showed police a deed that showed the home was in her name.

‘I’m walking out of the house expecting them to come and help, and they put me and my partner in handcuffs immediately.

‘I just kept saying, “I don’t know what’s going on; this is my dad’s house. My dad is dead”,’ Nora stated.

Daughter claims caregiver took deed to father’s Conway home before his death

A Conway man’s daughter says his caretaker had the deed to his home signed over to herself weeks before his death and didn’t tell her until after he was gone.

Police bodycam footage obtained by the local outlet also showed a male neighbor telling police he had been worried about what he’d been seeing next door.

‘She [Smalls] was allegedly coming here during the day and taking care of him, and one day she started moving furniture out, and he disappeared,’ he recalled.

The neighbor also claimed that Robert was not in his right mind.

‘She was only in here a very short time, and Bob, he was not within his wits at all. You could’ve talked him into just about anything. I even called senior services and asked them to look into it,’ he added.

Court documents also obtained by WMBF showed that Robert changed his personal affairs just months before his death, and according to Nora, she had no idea.

Smalls started taking care of Robert in March 2024 through a company called Griswold Home Care.

At the end of that month, Robert moved into a senior living facility, the outlet reported.

Then in April of that year, legal papers named Smalls as his power of attorney. By April 17, a quitclaim deed, or a legal document that transfers real estate interest from one person to another, was put through.

Because of that, the home was given to Smalls for a five-dollar fee, the report stated.

The criminal trespassing charges against Nora have since been dismissed, but she said she has not stopped fighting to take her father’s home from the nurse.

She believes her father was not at all aware of what he was signing away.

‘It’s so easy for them to get taken advantage of. He was a nice man; he would never think that someone could do this to him. I really can’t emphasize enough how many other people could easily get taken advantage of like this,’ Nora said.

The Conway Police Department told the outlet the agency is investigating the case.

Meanwhile, Horry County’s Registrar of Deeds Marion Foxworth III said that his office does not probe people’s motives, and only looks to see if the deed meets the state’s legal requirements.

‘If it contains all the correct information to meet the legal standard, then we record it. We don’t check whether what’s in that deed is fair or right,’ he shared.

When approached for comment by the Daily Mail, a spokesperson with Griswold Home Care confirmed Smalls’ employment with the company and said that ‘the allegation described in recent reporting is serious and concerning.’

‘We were made aware of this allegation for the first time this past weekend, despite the events in question having allegedly taken place several years ago,’ they added.

At the time of her employment, Smalls passed a background check and was assigned to work with Robert ‘for a very brief period in 2024.’

‘Based on our records, at the time of the referenced events involving the power of attorney and property transfer, Mr. Rowland was no longer receiving services through Griswold,’ the spokesperson added.